FCC Grants First AWS-3 Licenses

The Federal Communications Commission has approved its first batch of wireless licenses from the AWS-3 auction, which drew close to $45 billion in bids and helped relieve the financial pressure on the broadcast incentive auction. The vast majority of the granted licenses were for AT&T, Verizon (Cellco) and T-Mobile. The FCC put out the long-form applications for comment several weeks ago. None of the licenses had been challenged. Not in that batch were the licenses of the companies majority owned by Dish. Those have drawn criticism and opposition, at least to those companies' application for billions in designated entity discounts that are meant to encourage participation by small businesses.